Hello everybody and welcome to another edition of the language vlog podcast newsletter! :D

The weather is getting a bit cooler here in Beijing, so it's a thick sweater in the morning, but warm in the afternoon. We've had blue skies as of late, and the leaves are just starting to change colour. The very short window of fall time in Beijing is now underway before the blistering winds of winter come in.

But some exciting news! We're now streaming on ALL the major platforms! Subscribe below!

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It was a slower week for publications, but steady as ever for the studies. We had some connection issues and, as a result, were restricted in what we could live stream. We did however manage a 30-minute livestream on Tuesday in honour of China's National Day.

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This week's accomplishments:

1. Talking about Beijing and its hutongs
2. Reading Russian in the morning
3. An electric pipa performance in Beijing
4. And all about writing Traditional Chinese characters

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Interruptions and disruptions a go go! This week's Chinese live stream was pushed to Tuesday, October 1, in an effort to commemorate China's National Day. Seventy-five years in business (out of the 5000 years of documented history, as so many students will point out) but this year was a quiet one. No fly overs or big military parades. Instead, it was simply a nice, quiet, blue sky day.

As I watched on TV, Tiananmen Square was packed in the morning for the raising of the flag and playing of the national anthem, but it looks as though the big party meeting was held the day before rather than on Oct 1 itself.

Our livestream this week focused on looking at a map of Beijing, including its ring roads, central axis and a little bit about the hutongs. We looked at how the hutongs were put together and discussed a little bit about how to navigate them.

We also talked a little bit about the old city walls of Beijing and how the area south of Tiananmen Square has been revitalized into a tourist-friendly shopping area that focuses on traditional Beijing and Chinese elements.

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A bit of a change up in my own language studies as I had to figure out a way to incorporate more Russian language study into my day. Trying to fit in some reading time at the end of the day wasn't working as I was simply falling asleep all the time. So, what did I do?

First thing in the morning I sat down to do some reading in Russian!

I have some books I purchased while travelling through Russia years ago and have always meant to read them. I'm sure I'm not alone in this problem: buying a book, especially a book in a language I want to study, and then putting it away, either on a sofa chair, a nearby desk, or even just visibly on the bookshelf in an attempt to remind myself to "get to it one day."

And when does that day ever arrive?

Well, this is my goal now: to read at least ONE of the Russian books I bought, even if I don't understand all of it. The idea is to sit down every morning right after I get out of bed and BEFORE I go workout and read for 15-20 minutes. I use a stop watch to keep me honest in my timing and have so far done this two days in a row. Nothing spectacular, and we'll certainly see how this new routine holds up once work starts again next week!

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We didn't host a livestream for English/ESL this week but hope to do so once again next week.

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One YT Short we posted took a look at something that you don't often see: an electric pipa performance.

Out for the evening last week in the GuoMao area and up on the 6th floor of the China World Mall, there was a live performance by an expat artist, thruoutin, who specialized in noise and ambient music. For this performance he brought his electric pipa to mix with his melodic beats.

For those who are not familiar with the pipa itself, it is a traditional Chinese instrument similar in size to a ukelele. They are typically plucked with a finger pick and are often studied in music class. However, in this performance, thruoutin played a modified version of the pipa that had electronic inputs so he could then pass it through several effects pedals and the like.

You can CLICK HERE to view the video on Youtube.

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Finally, despite the lack of live streams, I DID manage to keep up my own language studies as I started practicing writing out Traditional Chinese characters.

Although I've mainly studied Simplified characters under the HSK system, Traditional characters, in my opinion, have always been the final destination of learning Chinese. By that I mean, Traditional characters are far more complex yet tell much more of the "story" that each character represents. Though you still cannot figure out the sound from looking at the character, you can wager a better guess as to its meaning.

But that is only one part of the equation.

Another reason for studying Traditional characters (and practicing writing them out) is because they are used OUTSIDE of the Mainland of China, notably in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore. I'm told Singapore and Malaysia still use Simplified, but from what I remember Traditional characters are used far more widely than the Simplified script outside of the Mainland.

That being the case, I don't imagine this being a major undertaking mainly because we don't need to write anything on a day to day basis, but knowing the difference between Traditional and Simplified I think is better than not knowing it.

Here's a look at my current writing practice:

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We'll leave it there for this week! We hope you're enjoying your long break if you're in China, and if you're outside, Happy Thanksgiving Day to our Canadian readers! Are other holidays this weekend?

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Comments? Questions? Concerns? Suggestions? Get in touch! We'd love to hear from you! You can email us here or follow us on YouTube and post a comment, we'll get back to you!

Thanks for reading and let us know if there's anything we can help you with!

-Steve

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